Will the growth of Smart Cities be seen most in the Developing World?

So, we found it interesting when we came across this story recently, highlighting plans to develop 100 smart cities in India.

The article discusses the merits of the concept, as well as concerns over the ability of the Indian infrastructure to integrate 100 smart cities into the overall network.

India’s transport network, for example, is one the largest in the world, with its road network ranking as the third longest in the world after China and the USA. Most of the Indian roads, however, are in poor condition, clogged up with traffic, and with an unreliable and unsafe public transport system operating.

Road safety in India is also a major issue – road fatalities in India are among the highest in the world – touching almost 140,000 in 2012 alone.

So within this current infrastructure, there are critics wondering if the country is actually able to deliver 100 smart cities – as discussed in this article.

We welcome the development of the Smart Cities model, but any development needs to be within an infrastructure that is able to accommodate and integrate the requirements for a smart city to successfully operate, whilst enhancing the lives of those within it.

Whether or not India’s Smart Cities vision unfolds favourably remains to be seen, and at least there seems to be a genuine attempt to embrace smart city technology in this vast continent with it’s overloaded transport networks. We watch with interest, of course.

We’ve also developed a Smart Cities App, to further highlight the technology behind the concept and intelligent mobility in the smart city – find out more about it here.

To find out more about our work on Smart Cities, please feel free to get in touch here.